Jazz Jubilee by the Sea 2021 is on track. We have connected with most of our bands with a few more yet to be determined to round out our festival roster. It is looking more and more hopeful that we will be able to have an indoor live event in California by the end of October.
The bands that we have contacted and are in the process of hiring are: Tom Rigney and Flambeau, Cornet Chop Suey, the Midiri Brothers Septet, Professor Cunningham and his Old School, the Molly Reeves Quartet, Sierra Seven, Blue Street, the New High Street Party Band, the Creole Syncopators, Gino and the Lone Gunmen, Mariachi Autlence, Crescent Katz, Larry, Dawn and Friends and Carl Sonny Leyland and Friends.
Our special guests this year so far are Larry Scala, Paul Ingle, Gary Ryan, Washboard Steve and Carl Sonny Leyland. We will have special musical guests during each of our jam sessions ably led by C.J. Sams. We will have dance lessons Friday morning at the Veteran’s Hall.
A highly anticipated new band for our festival will be the Holland/Coots Swingin’ West band from Nashville, Tennessee. Our Thursday night show will also be new, featuring the widely acclaimed trio, Groovus (Holland, Coots and Steven Pikal) with special guest Adrian Cunningham. You do not want to miss the only performance of this musical assemblage at our festival.
In addition to some new bands, we will also be trying out some new venues in our neighboring city, Grover Beach. The Grover Beach Community Center features wood floors throughout the facility, a generous wood floor stage, kitchen, outdoor area, on-site and street parking and a seating capacity of up to 400 people. The Ramona Park facility, also very nice, is surrounded by a park and will seat up to 120 people. Both of these facilities are close to Pismo Beach and can be accessed via the surface streets. This means that neither the buses nor the driving attendees will need to get on the freeway to shuttle between the sites. We will have buses again, using the same highly successful bus company from 2019, SLO Safe Ride. Parking is limited at most venues, so we encourage as many as possible to make use of the buses.
Our ticket pricing will be the same as was offered in 2020, pre-Jubilee, early bird $115 through September 15th, $120 September 16th through October 15th and 3-day $130 starting October 16th and at the door. Thursday night tickets $25. Single day badges are available, $60 for Friday, $80 for Saturday and $30 for Sunday. Half price badges will be available on Friday and Saturday starting at 5:00 p.m. We will continue our tradition of $30 3-day badges for those aged 30 and under- a remarkable value. Children 12 and under are free.
In addition to our live in-person shows, we will also offer the opportunity to watch a Livestream of the performances from one of the venues for those that cannot attend in person. The venue location of the Livestream has not yet been determined, but you will be able to watch all of the sets for the selected venue throughout the entire festival. Access to the Livestream will be available for the fee of $30. A link will be available on our website soon for you to sign up for this service. Please keep checking back at Pismojazz.com to see how to connect to this link. We will also be sending e-mails to our regular Jubilee distribution lists with this information.
As of this writing, the State of California has opened the door for large indoor events. Attendees will have to show their vaccination cards and capacity will be limited, but it is a great start. We hope that by the end of October we can be at full capacity and that vaccination cards will not be necessary. But at least we can see the light.
We are all very excited to be back in Pismo Beach and Grover Beach hosting the festival of a lifetime after a long, hard year. We think that many of you are anxious to rejoin us. Although things could change in the coming months and affect our plans, we will do our best to provide the entertainment and party atmosphere that has come to be associated with Jazz Jubilee by the Sea. We hope that we can all be together to make this happen.
